Samuel W. James is a new writer from Yorkshire, UK, and his poems have been accepted by Allegro, London Grip, Peeking Cat, Clockwise Cat, Elsewhere Journal, Adelaide Magazine and Ink, Sweat and Tears.

On the wall by the bus stop

the tapestry depictsthe Battle of Stamford Bridge. Opposite is a row of local shops;the butchers, where a goose once chased me,the pottery shop, where they held an afterschool club,the village store, where I never got ID’d.

And now the Christian kid is popular,the poor kid sells weed,the sad kid had his dad arrested for being a paedophile.

Those hymns and prayers are swinging back;

the year before they built the flood defences,battles over planning permission,brown water shooting out the drains,the village filling.

Police ferried the children to schoolin motorised dinghies, over waterthrough fog, I rememberwaving at all the parentsas I sailed with kids from different classes,the policeman smelling like aftershave.I felt like DiCaprio.

Then arrival, and singing and chanting,they stand, we kneel and mumble along,thanks for everything.

The music teacher looked like Jacob Reece-Mogg,he had a lot of power in this school.The headmaster, an eggy, bullish man,seemed to look up to him.His piano stool was especially tall.

The headmaster’s eyes went wild when all the childrenwere made to sing, All Things Bright and Beautiful.Maybe all things werefor them.

The Eagle

is clumsy,often stumbles,never quite flies up to its name.

when seen close up,struggles to negotiatethe crags of its home.

is famous and typically shy,seems uncomfortable sitting too longin the sky.

maintains a steady, if ungraceful, cruisetowards some far offgloom.

High Rise

The Landlord is deceased and this modern art of mould and peeling,I consider it a legacy.